Mother Rose

Air Of East | An Indian’s Way of Story Telling

Raghav, a historian in his fifties, and a traveller by passion was once fascinated with discovering Nisargadhama forest (Coorg), an ancient forest park of Karnataka.

The greeneries and panoramic views of mountains and jungles of Nisargadhama forest have always been in his list of exploring India.

After walking through jungles crossing small multiple rivers Raghav reached Abba’s Hut.

Abba, an old man, who was sarpanch of this ancient village, open heartedly welcomed Raghav, who happened to be his grandson’s friend.

It was raining heavily, in the month of July. Raghav was very tired, drenched completely in mud and water, started sneezing as he bowed down to touch the feet of Abba. Abba asked him to go inside the hut and change his clothes for good.

Mother Rose

Night came, and already Raghav was shivering with extreme cough and cold; he was in deep pain, as he felt his voice was chocking, he felt his time is near!

Suddenly he heard a knock at the door. After multiple knocking when nobody opened it, Raghav got up and opened the door.

Astonished, he saw a British woman, dressed in a British medieval white gown. And a doctor’s kit in her hand was looking straight in his eyes with her deep blue eyes. She told him ‘You must get well.’

Raghav asked her, ‘Who are you mother?’ (Raghav doesn’t know why he addressed her as mother.)

Rose. Rose is my name, child.

And then she waved her hand over Raghav’s head.

The next day, Raghav woke up in his cot and saw the sun was shining and the sun-rays were coming inside and touching the floor of the mud hut.

Raghav was feeling as if nothing has happened to him, he came outside the hut, and found a few villagers were sitting under a banyan tree. He rushed to the villagers and asked where does Doctor Rose stay?

To which the oblivious villagers said there is nobody in the village called Rose!

However, during the British Era in the 1920’s, there was a doctor called Rose, who was called Mother Rose, a mother who stayed in this Indian village and loved every villager as her own child. She was a healer by birth and she used to reach any villager’s hut at night, getting an intuition of his sickness or poor health conditions, as she used to say ‘You must get well!’